Username: 
Password:    
Remember Me

Search by :  Username E-mail Region Interest AOL IM ICQ Number Yahoo! ID MSN Username Jabber

Agent Washington (completelysane) wrote in valarlogs, @ 2017-02-02 05:11:00

Who: Wash and Carolina
When: Backdated to September 26
Where: Hunting cabin in Yosemite
What: Day three of detox
Rating/Warnings: High for violent hallucinations (hallucinated character deaths done with permission from players)
Status: Complete Part two | Part One posted here



Day Three
The hallucinations were sneaky at first, tricks of the light and noises outside his window that made him cringe and jump and question whether or not they really were in a hunting cabin in the middle of the woods.

Carolina had taken to leaving a cup of coffee in the hallway as she watched over him as he tossed and turned. As the clock slowly ticked toward noon she wondered if the cup had managed to weld itself to her hand. She watched as Wash began to look suspiciously at shadows and occasionally she thought she caught him murmuring something under his breath at them. Her suspicions of just how much his body had been relying on alcohol to function were confirmed. It was not surprising, considering what had occurred before they had left, but it left her worrying more and more as the tremors and jumpiness intensified.

What was surprising to her was the emergence of the dog from beneath the table. After returning inside that morning, the dog had taken up a sentry position at the foot of Wash’s bed. Every time she had pulled away to start a fresh pot of coffee, the dog would take up her place as sentry at the door. Carolina tried to get Wash to the living room but the temptation of the door also seemed to be stronger today. A second walk was quickly ruled out and she settled into a pattern of shadowing him while remaining in his line of sight.

Wash didn’t even notice the dog when she came out from under the table and stationed herself at the foot of his bed or at the door. In fact, he didn’t even notice when Carolina left the bedroom or when she came back at first. There was something wrong with the cabin. Terribly, terribly wrong. It had started with the noises outside in the woods, noises that sounded suspiciously like shots from automatic weapons far off in the distance. They made Wash jump and cringe and stare at the window. He glanced at Carolina, ready for orders, but she was just standing at the doorway. Why was she just standing there? Didn’t she hear what was going on outside? She had to of. But she was just standing there watching him. The way she was looking at him sent a shiver up his spine.

He was no longer aware of how badly his body was shaking, or how the thick layer of sweat on his skin made his clothes stick to him, or how hard he was breathing, or the sound of his heart racing and pounding in his ears. He was aware of how unbearably hot it was in the cabin, an awful lot like the way the desert had felt. The desert on their last assignment, with the sun beating down on their camp, on their helmets and flack jackets as they trudged through the sand and scrub. Even their guns had been hot in their hands, threatening to sear through their gloves as they tracked their target.

As the sun, that brilliant fucking ball of searing heat, traced its way through the sky towards its zenith, the noises outside got closer, louder. They were unmistakingly the sounds of gunfire, and now, voices. Wash could hear them plainly, although he could not quite make out who the voices belonged to, or what it was they were saying. And Carolina still stood there, calmly watching.

She hadn’t hindered his movements within the cabin and she hadn’t given him orders to leave or stay. That wasn’t like Carolina at all. She would have said something by now. Wash crouched low between the couch and the wall and dared to peer out the window. “They’re close,” he murmured more to himself than Carolina. “No visual yet though.” He cringed slightly with the next volley.

Carolina tensed as she returned with a fresh cup of coffee. She had seen that look on Wash all too often when they had been out in the field. His eyes were lingering on those shadows, now. Seeing things that were not there. In the silence of the cabin, she was barely able to catch his words. “Who’s close?” Was it more dangerous to let him believe the hallucination or to try and tell him that he was seeing things?

It was as if she were debating waking up a sleepwalker, except a thousand times more deadly. Wash was a very well trained Marine. In his current state it was not impossible that things were going to get very bad, very fast, and she would have to be the one to stop him. Carolina’s fingers tightened on the mug and she leaned against the doorframe, praying he would stay in bed and let whatever, or whomever, he believed was coming pass them by.

With what Wash believed to be a battle going on outside in the woods - which were starting to take on a more sinister look, almost like some kind of deserted urban landscape - there was no way he was staying in bed. He remained crouched with his back pressed against the wall, staying low so not to become a target for any potential snipers lurking out there on those rooftops. He peered up at the window, craning his neck to see outside. Sweat glistened on the skin of his forehead and chest. Without moving his head, clouded grey eyes moved towards Carolina, a look of confusion flickering over them. How could she not know? This was their mission. “The insurrectionists,” he answered flatly, his voice hoarse from the night before.

The mission had gone bad and no one was reporting in. Wash didn’t like that. Not one bit. Usually Carolina would have been barking into her comm by now, demanding York to report in. But she was still standing there, not doing anything. None of this made any sense.

A noise came from outside, a caw of a crow, but to Wash it was no bird. Instead he heard the voice of his best friend, screaming as though he were being tortured to death. Wash’s breath caught in his throat and for a moment he was frozen, crouched against the wall. “Gale?” He breathed in horror. Another caw-turned-scream had him on his feet. He rushed for the door and outside, barefoot and clad only in the pajama pants Carolina had coaxed him into sometime the evening previous. He raced away from the cabin and into the underbrush, seeking cover as he had been trained, staying low and out of sight. He didn’t notice the gravel and twigs digging into the soles of his feet, or the briars scratching at his arms and back. In the world Wash’s mind had given him, they didn’t even exist. Gale was out there somewhere, possibly wounded and caught and Wash had to find him. He had to find York, had to find out why the fuck he hadn’t reported in!

Gunfire was all around him now, loud and disorienting. Shadows thrown by trees and boulders formed into faceless enemies, well armed and shooting down Wash’s squad, his friends, his family.

“Gale?!” his voice echoed in the woods around him, but to Wash it was swallowed up by the deafening sounds of battle. A drunkard can’t protect anyone, not even himself. Epsilon mocked him, throwing Carolina’s voice in his head, telling Wash he couldn’t save her. She had died after being thrown off cliff while he’d been powerless to stop it. He couldn’t save York, shot to death on a lonely abandoned island while he still played Good Soldier. He couldn’t save North, betrayed by his own sister. And South…they’d shared a bed and Wash had killed her himself. Remember that, Washington? Remember how you shot her in the head, right between the eyes? She was injured and couldn’t even defend herself. Revenge, wasn’t it? But you’re the worst fighter on the squad. You couldn’t beat her in a fair fight, so you shot her when she was defenseless. How can you even dream of saving them? You fucked up. You failed. They needed you, they counted on you and you let them down. Every. Single. One.

Wash shook as he stumbled through the woods. He tried to shake Epsilon off, tried to run from him. There was still time. He could save them. Save them all. ”Gale!” He screamed desperately, voice cracking with the strain. “Where are you?!”

He’s dead. They’ve killed him by now. He was going to get married, you know. You were supposed to be his best man. What kind of best man lets the groom die? What are you going to tell Leliana? How will you be able to even face her? She’ll kill you, you know, for letting her lover die. You’d like that, wouldn’t you? Have her end it for you. That’s too easy. She’ll try, but you’ll survive. You always do.

Wash was lost, deep in the woods somewhere off the path he and Carolina had hiked yesterday morning to see the sun rise. For Wash there was no path, the woods had long ago ceased to exist and he was trapped somewhere between realities, deep within a futuristic urban environment with strange desert like features. Sand, drifted up the sides of shelled out buildings long ago abandoned by the civilians who had once called this place home. The sun was overhead beating down mercilessly to the point Wash wondered if he would die of heat stroke before he found anyone. ”Gale!” he continued to call desperately, but he received no response. The crow whose screech had driven Wash from the safety of the cabin was long gone. “Please,” Wash whimpered, “answer me.”

A noise caught his attention. The snapping of a twig under his own foot made him whirl around. He’d come to a clearing, a spot where the sand had been driven away by the wind and he saw them. Forms of fallen bodies littered the ground. Wash ran to the clearing, leaving bloody footprints in the tree litter. He came to a stop in the center of the clearing. There, on the ground, were the bodies of the people he’d been searching for. Horrified grey eyes landed on the burned remains of York’s body first, charred and barely recognizable. They moved over the rest. North, his neck twisted around so that he was looking upwards even though he was lying chest down. South, a single bullet wound in her forehead. C.T.,with an ax buried in her back as she’d tried to run away. Wyoming’s body lay on one side of the clearing and his head at the other. Maine, blood pooled under him as if he had been pushed from some great height.

It wasn’t only the bodies of his squad Wash found. There were others. Stefan, was there, looking as though some great beast had torn him to shreds, had ripped him apart. Anna. Oh, Anna. Her body lay near Stefan’s. Her body too was marred with slashes and deep gouges, as though she’d been mauled to death by the same creature. One of her arms was reaching out towards her dear friend, as if trying to reach for him. Nearby, a little separated from the others was Katou. His mechanical arm had been ripped right off of his body, sword and all and tossed aside. His body had so many holes in it. Large ones that looked as though they had been slashed through him. This couldn’t be happening. What were they doing there?! How could this have happened?! There was one body left at the far end of the clearing. Wash approached it slowly, already knowing full well who it was, but hoping against hope he was wrong. His hopes were shattered when he saw Gale, throat slashed so deeply it had nearly taken his head off. His blood stained the ground under him practically black.

“No…” Wash whimpered as he sank to his knees. Tears streamed down his face in rivers, his sobs caught hard in his chest.

He was alone, save for one relentless ghost. A drunkard can’t protect anyone. And you couldn’t protect them. You couldn’t save them. You can’t save anyone. Did you honestly think you could? They were waiting for you, hoping you’d save them and look what happened! LOOK WHAT YOU’VE DONE!

Wash doubled over and retched, bile dripped from his lips and stung his already aching throat. He couldn’t look. He’d seen enough. “Why?” he gasped between gags, “why them?”

You make me sick Epsilon’s voice, still mocking, had changed. A cold feeling came over Wash from behind when he heard that deep mocking voice loom over him as it had since he’d been ten years old. Look at you. Weak and worthless. After everything I did to toughen you up, you’re still a pathetic waste of space, Davie. They always saved you, pulled your skinny ass out of the fire and now look. You couldn’t even run fast enough to get to them. Are you going to try to tell yourself you can keep going now? Why should you bother? You will always fail. Just kill yourself and get it over with.

Wash heard something else. The sounds of footsteps. He cringed away from it until he felt something cold and wet press against his bare shoulder and a soft soulful whine in his ear. He gasped and jerked away and stared at the face of a german shepherd for a solid minute, before he realized what it was he was looking at.

The woods were wholly unfamiliar to Carolina, but the dog had never wavered in her pursuit. Between the screams and occasional breaking of branches, she had a good idea of what direction Wash had gone after he had blinded her with the coffee. Every now and then she would catch glimpses of a black and brown coat, as if the dog had waited for her to catch up before continuing.

Eventually, she managed to tail Wash to the small clearing. Carolina made her way cautiously across the open space, trying not to spook him into yet another dash. Drops fell from her bangs, leaving a steady trail of coffee against the dry ground. Her hands were up, palms open to show that she had not brought any weapons with her.

“Hey, Gunney,” she tried in what she hoped was a soothing voice. Carolina’s eyes never left him as she approached, stopping a few feet away and crouching down to his level. She caught the smell of sharp acid on the breeze and shifted her weight, balancing on the balls of her feet so that she could move at a moment’s notice. “Take it easy. No one’s going to hurt you.”

Wash was still staring at the dog when Carolina came to the clearing. She could have barrelled her way through and he probably wouldn’t have noticed. It was only when he heard her voice that he looked at her. It was soft and a stark contrast to what was blaring in his head in a relentless assault, telling him to do give up, to just shoot himself and be done with it. And, oh, how he wanted to. He wanted to join the others, York and North, Gale and Anna. He wanted to go with them so much it was literally the scariest thought he’d ever had.

But there was Carolina, right there in the middle of all this death. Wash’s eyes were haunted when they moved from the spot to her left where he and he alone saw York’s dead body up to Carolina’s face. It was obvious he’d been crying. He still was crying. “B-Boss?” His voice shook and even though it was barely a whisper, it seemed thunderous to him. “You’re alive?”

Carolina felt her chest tighten. It was difficult to keep her voice from breaking, but she forced it to remain steady. He needed her to be strong. “Yeah, Gunney. I’m alive.” Still crouched, she chanced another step forward. “You can’t get rid of me that easily. We Churches are like cockroaches, remember? Always find a way back.” It was one of the few good traits they seemed to have had inherited from their asshole of a father. Beside them, the dog moved to lie down with her back against Wash’s leg, apparently content to watch the surrounding woods now that Carolina had found him.

She was within an arm’s reach now, but she did not dare make any sudden moves just in case he bolted again. If what he was seeing was anything like one of her nightmares, it would be better if he came to her and not the other way around. “I’m alive,” she repeated, mostly because he looked like he did not quite believe it. “And so’re you. Guess that means we should stick together, huh?” Palm up, she offered him her hand.

Wash looked at the hand held out towards him and cringed. You can’t save her either. Everyone around you, everyone you love, dies in the end. No one is safe as long as they are with you.

His face was flush with fever and sweat dripped off his nose as he looked from Carolina at the bodies he saw around them. She must not have seen them yet. “Everyone’s dead,” he said. “I tried to save them, but-” a hic-uped sob cut him off. He swallowed hard and looked to the other side of the clearing, where the bodies of their squad lay. “I wasn’t fast enough. You were right. I couldn’t protect anyone. And now...they’re all dead.” His face twisted in despair. “York, North.” He gestured pathetically towards that end of the clearing where only a few dead trees and logs lay on the ground. “And...Anna and Stefan and Katou….Gale...Gale was screaming and I couldn’t-” his body shook with another retch.

The dog at his side craned her neck back to look at him and whined again. When he moved, she hurriedly got to her feet, as if she was just concerned as Carolina that the man next to her would bolt into the woods again.

Half-turning toward the clearing, Carolina let him see her look around before turning back. For better or worse, he was going to have to face the truth at some point. Might as well be now. She shifted one foot back slightly, preparing to move quickly just in case it went badly. Here goes nothing. “But there’s nothing there, Wash.” She said gently. “Gale, Anna, Stefan, York...they’re all alive, back in Orange County. You haven’t failed them.” North was an unknown and she did not want to lie to him, even by accident.

“I know you tried. You’ve always done your best, even in the Dreams. That’s why we came here, remember? To make sure you’ll be around to protect them.” Carolina pointed out, refusing to give up trying to reach out to him with her hand. “I know that sometimes you do your best, you do everything like you’re supposed to and-... and it still isn’t enough. But that doesn’t mean you should stop trying.”

He seemed so small to her, curling himself away from the world. Every tear, every look of agony on his face made her heart twist a little more. Wash had come with her, followed her yet again into the middle of nowhere with naught but the promise of an absolutely shitty week that would hopefully end up helping him. “I’m not going anywhere without you, Wash. If you want to keep running, then I’ll run with you. If you’re ready to go back, we’ll make the trek back together. No man left behind, right?” Please reach him. Her front foot inched a bit closer.

“What?” Wash was staring at her in utter confusion. Then he shook his head, a violent movement that nearly made him fall over. “No, they’re there. They’re right there!” He jabbed his finger in the direction where he saw the bodies, where nothing but debris normal for a forest actually lay. “And they’re dead. Can’t you see them?! The insurrectionists - they murdered them. All of them…” his mouth continued to move for a moment even after his voice stopped obeying. He was listening to Carolina and what she said did make some kind of sense. He wanted to believe that the people he cared about were alive and well and all back home in California and not here, with their blood pooling and drying on the cracked baked ground.

But it was hard to not believe what was right in front of his eyes. He pulled his legs under him and attempted to stand, stumbling to his knees once, before finally getting upright. As Carolina continued to talk to him - talk him down from wherever it was he found himself, just beyond her reach - he cautiously approached the bodies again. He took a few tentative, almost fearful, steps.

Are they really there? Aren’t they? Can’t you tell the difference? It’s finally happened, hasn’t it, Washington? You’re completely and utterly insane.

Wash stopped where he was, his arms falling to his sides. “Carolina?” He said, wavering on unsteady legs. “Am I crazy?” He looked back towards her. “If I run, would you really come with me?”

She not look back at the clearing again. There was no point. Rising as Wash stumbled to his feet, Carolina kept a sharp eye on him. He looked like he was still running a fever, although she tried to see the sweating as a sign it might break soon.. Her eyes stayed on him as she walked forward, stopping once she was beside him. The dog danced a bit, as if unsure whether the human was going to start running again now that he was standing.

“You’re not crazy. You’re detoxing.” The only difference being that his current state was temporary. Carolina was pretty sure seeing dead bodies in logs and blood in patches of moss on a daily basis were not good signs of sanity. “Believe it or not, hallucinations are actually normal.” Extremely worrisome and a sign of extreme alcohol addiction, but normal nonetheless. “There’s nothing there.”

Since the mountain was still refusing to move, Carolina decided to take matters into her own hands. Literally, in this case, as she carefully took one of Wash’s hands in her own. If he was planning on taking off, he would have to shake her off or pull her along with him. “Of course I’ll run with you, Wash.” Her lips quirked up a bit. “But only if you can keep up.”

The look on Wash’s face was utter confusion, but he wasn’t arguing with her any longer. For a moment he simply stared straight ahead at those bodies that he now knew only he could see.. He seemed to accept that he was hallucinating. As worrisome as it was for Carolina, it was preferable than accepting that his friends had all been murdered while he had stumbled around some strange urban environment.

His head jerked in Carolina’s direction when she took his hand. He didn’t try and shake her off. He just stared at her, as if he either hadn’t understood her words or actually heard them. Then it seemed as though the words slowly sunk in. As they did, the confusion melted away leaving only exhaustion. “I don’t want to run anymore,” he said quietly. “I don’t feel good. Can we go home?”

Home, huh? There had been a time when Carolina had not thought her “home” would be something bundled and carried about in her pack. The string of pre-furnished apartments that she’d occupied in the States had always been temporary and devoid of personal touches. She had more personal effects at the storage unit in Austin than at all of those places combined. The last thing she had expected was to stay for any length of time in California, but finding Wash had changed a lot of things for her. For both of them.

“Walking it is.” Carolina turned to head back in the direction they had come. It was not their apartment, their home, but it would have to do for now. “Let’s head back to the cabin. York packed some tea into one of those boxes and you could use some more fluids.” Before they came right back up again. Or were sweated out with his fever. But at least he would have them for a short time and that would do him some good

The dog led the way back, stopping just ahead of them every few minutes to make sure that the two humans had not managed to get lost again. A few steps in, Wash stumbled again and Carolina finally let go of his hand, only to wrap a steadying arm around his waist instead. It was slow going, even with a guide leading them in a reasonably straight path. Nearly an hour had passed before the whitewashed walls of the cabin could be seen again through the trees. It was a stark contrast to the mere handful of minutes it had taken them to get to the clearing, but for once the former officer did not mind taking the long way back.

Gone were the sounds of gunshots and of war. There were no more disembodied screeches on the wind. Everything was eerily calm as Carolina guided Wash back towards their cabin. It wasn’t home, but Wash didn’t care. He would remember very little about the walk back to the cabin. It was as if he’d closed his eyes once and when he opened them again he and Carolina were standing in front of the little hunting cabin. The dog was waiting for them, tail wagging.

Once they were inside, Wash made it as far as the couch before his legs refused to go any further. His body was exhausted, but he managed to sit up long enough to take the cup of tea Carolina handed him. Under her calm insistence, Wash drank about half of the cup before setting it aside in favor of laying down.

The rest of the afternoon Wash was in and out of consciousness. Fever dreams haunted him when he was out and visions plagued him when he was awake. Sometimes the two blended in to one another and Carolina could never be sure what she would be in store for the next time Wash stirred. Around midafternoon he woke himself up screaming and pleading with an unseen force that appeared to be beating him senseless. He begged forgiveness, promised he wouldn’t do “it” again. A few hours later, what appeared to be lucidity quickly became apparent that Wash found himself trapped between realities once more, this time favoring the realities of the Middle East.

Another mission, though there were no attempts to leave the cabin again. Wash spoke to the members of their squad as though they were really there, even reaching out for them and becoming confused when he grasped at nothing.

He had brief moments in which it appeared as though he knew where he was and what was going on. In these brief and fleeting moments, he spoke to Carolina without filter. He told her about his fears, his regrets, his anger and his guilt, anything and everything that crossed his mind went immediately out his mouth without so much as a pause or check.

All the while the German shepherd remained stationed by the couch and watched. She seemed concerned that the sick human may attempt to run out the door again. Every time Wash moved, the dog whined. If Carolina wasn’t within two or three feet from the couch, the dog gave a nervous yip to alert her that her charge had stirred. Otherwise, she maintained a silent vigil.

Carolina was grateful for those yips, especially as the afternoon wore on. Just when she was about to nod off, the dog would yip or nudge her to indicate a change in their charge and she would take the opportunity to make a fresh pot of coffee. The constant stream of coffee had kept her awake for the most part, but it was beginning to tax her nerves. Much like the missions Wash kept reliving, she had fallen into old habits. She ran mental games and flexed limbs to keep them from cramping while she waited for the next set of hallucinations to make themselves known.

Yet in those fleeting patches of sanity when Wash spoke, Carolina listened. She sat a silent confessor to his thoughts, never interrupting, but committing each word to memory. Sometimes she would move to sit beside him on the couch, other times she would remain on the floor with her back by his legs and the dog sitting calmly beside her. Even after her cup was empty she would not move, waiting instead until he dropped off or fell back asleep to refill it.

More than once Carolina had thought how strange it was that the two of them had known one another for so long, and yet she knew so little about the boy he had been or what had shaped him into the man he had become. All those things that had not been important before, when she was more concerned with how to use his skills effectively in the field and not how many days it had been since she had last seen him smile.

However, all the coffee in the world was not enough to keep her completely focused as the sun began to set. Carolina found herself drifting off more and more often while Wash was still, only to be woken up by soft bark or a not-so-subtle nudge by a furry nose. Sometime after the improvised dinner of coffee and toast for her, more tea for Wash, the episodes began spacing themselves further and further apart, until the two of them fell into a restless and mercifully dreamless sleep sometime in the early hours of the morning.